If it were me, as soon as I found a civilization in my simulation, I'd shut down all the dust clouds and run many versions of the civilization. The big limitati

If it were me, as soon as I found a civilization in my simulation, I'd shut down all the dust clouds and run many versions of the civilization. The big limitation of studying our civilization from the inside is that we only see one path, so it's hard to tell what parts of history were inevitable vs. accidental. In a sim, you could fork 100 copies of earth starting from 1900 and watch all kinds of different futures unfold. We can't know for sure what would interest simulation runners, but they must come from a technological civilization and would presumably find other civilizations more interesting than dust clouds.